


L'amour et la mort

by ladyofrosefire



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Dom/sub, Dream Sex, F/M, I don't really have an excuse for this, Light Bondage, Vax'ildan is a mess, Worship, except for the bit where Matt Mercer is clearly some kind of demigod with storytelling powers, light painplay, this should surprise no one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-06
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-12 01:39:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11726817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyofrosefire/pseuds/ladyofrosefire
Summary: Each champion cannot help but love the Queen, and Vax'ildan has always fallen a little in love with everyone he meets.Fic contains slightly questionable dreamscape sex with a death Goddess. Details in author's note.





	L'amour et la mort

Vax dreams of a woman above him.

He thinks, at first, that it’s Keyleth. He dreams of this less often now that he has it for real, her in his arms at night, her hair tickling his chest. Still, he does dream of her from time to time.

But it isn’t her. Keyleth isn’t soft-- they run too much, fight too much, for any of them to be soft. But she’s warm. She radiates heat and light and love. The woman above him now is-- is--

She is marble and obsidian. She sits astride him, painted in moonlight and darkness too complete to be shadow. Her hair tumbles around Her shoulders and blends into Her black, feathered robe.

**_Vax’ildan._ **

The last time She spoke to him, he was just back from death and She was reminding him of the debt he owes Her. He chokes on air, twists below Her. At the same time, his hands come up and find Her legs, through the robe, where they rest against his sides. He feels the pressure of them with each inhale.

**_You called me here, my champion._ **

“Did I?”

The Raven Queen strokes his cheek. Her touch sends chills through him. Vax shudders beneath Her and his hands tighten on Her thighs. And slowly, as it always has around Her, his heartbeat begins to slow. His breathing gentles. Then, against the chill of Her, desire begins to gather. It spools up around his spine and then spreads, hot and insistent, dragging at him like the pull of the earth itself.

Maybe it’s only because She’s a goddess, and his Goddess at that, but he feels something in him shift. When he moves again, it’s to try and push closer. The pressure of Her legs at his sides holds him in place.

There is no bed beneath him. As always, he meets Her in an empty place half womb and half grave. Around them stretches the golden net, woven into patterns he thinks he understands for only a moment before they dissolve again and force his gaze away. And She is everywhere. She is this place as much as She is the figure astride him. Very slowly, he looks up.

And up.

And up.

And then The Queen is human-sized, but still tall, her mask smiling down at him, black hair swirling as if caught in a current. She touches his chest, and his armor melts away into the blackness around them. His wings remain, stretched wide. Otherwise, he lays before Her, beneath Her, naked as the day he was born, body thrumming like a plucked cord. Vax averts his gaze, or tries to. She is everywhere.

**_This is not the first time one of my champions has come to me like this. For this._ **

He cannot tell if Her tone is amused, fond, or some combination of the two.

“My Queen, please--”

Her head tilts, the smile stretches impossibly wide, and a finger trails down his neck to the dip between his collar bones.

**_Hush now, Vax’ildan._ **

His spine bows. The way She touches him feels like biting wind and lightning and the first breath after resurrection. It hurts-- enough that he think he might scream. And at the same time, he feels himself somehow drawn to the brink. He hangs there, caught and twisting, his chest rising and falling with his rapid breaths.

**_Hush._ **

This time, there is less pain. Her palm presses against the center of his chest. Vax tries to reach for Her, for anything, and finds himself tangled in the net of golden threads-- one thread, when he looks. He should not be able to think so clearly, and yet he knows the thread that binds him is his own. It makes him want to scream for an entirely different reason.

But, Gods, he doesn’t want Her to stop. The thought of Her leaving makes him ache, makes him feel hollow. And what would he do? He knows he has to be as close in waking as he is here.

He goes as still as he can.

 **_There you are_ **.

There is no mistaking the pride in Her voice.

**_My beautiful champion._ **

He feels Her fingers in his hair, carding through his feathers, tapping against his ribs. She is a Goddess, and so she toys with him. But she is the Raven Queen, so She toys less than another might have in her place. He can do nothing but hang beneath Her and tremble.

For a moment, She seems to rise. One moment, She is over him, impassive as marble, the next, She has a human face. Red eyes. Smiling red lips. Her skin is still cold and white as fresh snow, and Vax gasps as her bare legs squeeze his hips. Her robe spills around them, fading into the dark.

And--

This shouldn’t work.

She’s cold. She’s a Goddess. He’s mortal and asleep and-- And a thousand other reasons that should matter to him right then, but cannot, because She has consumed him. She moves with her hands braced over his heart, over the blossoming bruise She left on him at his resurrection, and just keeps going. She takes and takes and--

\-- _takes_

Until his perception is so muddled he cannot tell which way it up.

The strangest part is that he cannot tell if She’s silent or not. His own cries ring in whatever space this is seemingly for an age before the darkness, before the Raven Queen, swallows them. Sometimes, though, when he looks at Her, he swears he can see Her mouth forming sounds. Sometimes he thinks he can hear them. But he cannot be certain.

Mortals are not meant to love Gods like this, but after their deal, he does not know what he is.

And he does love Her, the Goddess, and the flashes of the woman She used to be that he thinks he sees. That love fills him to bursting, winds through him, presses, pushes, _drags_ at him--

It breaks from him as the Raven Queen presses her lips to his.

He wakes. He cannot say if he felt Her come, or heard it. He knows only that he is sticky and spent, his body aching and his heart pounding, and that his mouth tastes like blood.

**Author's Note:**

> WRT consent: The Raven Queen is a Goddess and knows everything he's thinking. Vax is a bit in love with her. But he's also asleep and the whole situation is weird as all hell. So if anything other than repeated, enthusiastic consent skeeves you out (which I totally get), this may not be the fic for you. That said, I wouldn't call this dubious. It's pretty much standard for this ship
> 
> The working title for this thing was "Don't Even Look At Me". Did I want this to be my entry into this fandom? No. Am I surprised that it is? No.  
> I love the Raven Queen a lot.


End file.
